Harry and Vanessa’s barn wedding took place in September. The day was relaxed, fun and geeky, they also had a cheerful blue and yellow colour scheme. “We gave up on picking or really sticking to a particular theme”, wrote the bride, “instead we just used anything we liked – it was much easier that way, and felt a lot more personal!”
“Firstly, we obviously looked at Rock n Roll Bride a lot for ideas! It was really great to see that other people wanted to have weddings that were different, as to begin with we felt a bit of pressure to ‘fit in’ and have a very typical wedding. After a lot of false starts, we realised that we just wanted to throw a big party with our friends and family, and have a day that was personal to us, lots of fun, and informal.”
“We ended up doing a lot of DIY and tried to include tons of references and things that we enjoy and love, regardless of whether or not it ‘belonged’ in a wedding! We handmade Super Mario star decorations (and my earrings matched!), Lego heart centrepieces, pictures of comic book couples, yellow and blue Claptrap robots as bride and groom cake toppers (from the videogame Borderlands), Pokémon inspired place names and table names, brightly iced cupcakes, and Star Wars recessional music. We also brought our vinyl Batman and Robin toys to celebrate with us – they go everywhere with us!”
“We probably did way too much DIY!” she laughed. “I don’t really like flowers so when we saw alternative bouquet ideas I knew I wanted to do that instead. I had a lot of buttons and embroidery thread left to my family by my late grandmother, and knew making felt and ribbon flowers would be the perfect way to have her spirit present. It took us about a year to make enough for three bouquets, centrepieces, and buttonholes!”
“My parents and family in the Philippines made bunting and a cousin had our initials printed on them”, she continued. “Harry’s father built and painted a bike in our wedding colours. We also made and iced 120 cupcakes – I baked and the best man and the bridesmaids iced and decorated. If you are going to make cupcakes for your wedding then definitely don’t do what I did and leave baking until the week before the wedding! Baking and freezing is a good idea!”
“The best bit about out wedding was how much fun we all had! Or the food. I also loved how the flowers/bouquet went from being things that I wasn’t too fussed about to being super meaningful and something that I’ll keep forever.”
“I loved how much of our stuff we managed to incorporate into the day”, Harry took over, “and how relaxed and fun it was. We managed to make a day that was very personal and reflected us and our loves, but also didn’t isolate or scare any of the family. We got the perfect balance, and everyone seemed to enjoy the day. We both managed to really enjoy it and step back knowing we’d both put a lot of work into it.”
